Plagiarism Statistics

Many people presume that plagiarism holds little gravity in the world of crime, as it is a sheer act of scrounging another individual’s perception.

However, in reality this felony is not as straightforward as it may sound. Plagiarism is a two-fold offense. Firstly, it involves stealing the intellectual thought of someone else and secondly, deceiving and projecting it as one’s own work.

Research conducted by the Psychological Record represents that 36 percent of undergraduates are involved in some kind of plagiarism. Also, surveys by prestigious institutes such as The Center for Academic Integrity have established that about 80 percent of college students have committed the act at least once in their lifetime. In fact astonishingly, statistics revealed that students themselves are not averse to the concept of allowing their peers to duplicate their work. In the year 1969, 58.3 percent of high school students allowed peers to copy and duplicate their work by self-consensus, and within a span of two decades; in 1989, the statistics had risen to 97.5 percent.

One of the significant reasons for an increase in this offense is that almost 90 percent of the students have not been punished by the school or college authorities at the right time and therefore they are extremely confident of getting away scot-free. As per records furnished a survey, about 257 chief student affairs officers emphasized that the authorities at various educational institutions in the country have not handled the problem of plagiarism with the required strictness.

Studies have highlighted that around 47 percent of students are convinced that their teachers turn a blind eye towards cheating, and therefore, feel free to engage in the offense. As for the professors, many feel that the authorities concerned have not empowered them adequately to avert the situation; while there are still others who are in a complete state of denial and choose to be oblivious to the seriousness of the situation. Since, the progress of the Internet has made plagiarism quite easy, there are some professors who find it extremely tedious to use websites to locate cases of literary theft. Plagiarism statistics clearly reveal that nearly seven out of ten students resort to this act.

Plagiarism is an issue that has been an ardent subject of study by many intellectuals. As in the case of any fraud, this act too has its own interpretation and reasoning. Various facts have been highlighted as potent reasons for this act of misdemeanor. More..